Strange Days JosefMick Slash
by Emerald72
Summary: Josef and Mick go on a road trip, Mick has an existential crisis halfway. Written for the 20 est relships comm on LiveJournal: Prompt - Memories. Josef/Mick Slash  Male/Male pairing


Title: Strange Days

Pairing: Josef/Mick

Rating: R

Disclaimer: All publicly recognisable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise. No copyright infringement is intended.

Summary: Josef and Mick go on a road trip, Mick has an existential crisis halfway.

Author's Note: Written for 20_est_relships on LiveJournal

* * *

They were headed off on a road trip, just the two of them; drive past the city limits, and get away for a while. Maybe see the sights down Reno way; chase whiskified blood streams under the neon gaze of Vegas. At least that was the plan.

By nightfall they'd reached Death Valley. The car's UV tinted windows had protected them from the harsh reality of daylight until then. Mick nudged Josef awake, made some passing crack about two dead men driving through this place. One eye half open, Josef muttered something about undead really not being the same thing at all, and promptly fell back to sleep.

Mick remembered back to another time, fifty odd years ago, the same stretch of baked earth. There'd been no roads back then, not through here at least, gradually though, the urban sprawl had begun to invade the Valley like everywhere else.

Mick wound down his window, took a few good hits of night air into his lungs, turned his attention to the car stereo then. The Doors drifted from the speakers; Mick cranked the volume, and sang along with Jim, a little out of tune.

"_Get together, if we tried…"_

And he had tried, oh lord how he had tried - first Coraline, then Beth. It wasn't the getting together part that was the problem, it was the staying.

Mick wrenched the steering wheel to the right, sent the car spinning almost out of control as he slammed on the brakes, and screeched to a halt; a vapour trail of gravel and dust left in his wake.

"Josef," Mick shook Josef curled up asleep in the passenger seat alongside him, waited for a response, and then shook him again. "Josef, come on man wake up."

"Are we being attacked by marauding space pirates?" Josef yawned, and stretched catlike, before settling back down– space pirates notwithstanding.

"No." For a moment Mick's brow furrowed with confusion.

"Then good - wake me up when we are." Josef stifled another yawn, and muttered something unintelligible.

"Josef, come on this is serious," Mick gave Josef another shove, rougher this time. "I think I'm having an existential crisis."

Josef sat up, lips pursed in annoyance, and pointed towards the road in front of them. "There's a motel five miles from here, drive to it; we'll talk then. In the meantime, I need my beauty sleep."

Josef huffed, and then closed his eyes, shifting in his seat as he tried to reacquaint himself with comfort. Mick gunned the engine of the car, and headed back into the night; hunched over the steering wheel, watching the road as it stretched off into the distance.

Fifteen minutes later, and Mick was pulling up to the front of the Oakridge Inn. Five miles, just like Josef had said. He turned the engine off, left the keys in the ignition as he went to arrange a room for the night.

"How long you boys planning to stay?" the desk attendant drawled, his knees creaking under the weight of his ample frame as he ran a quick hand through what remained of his hair, and went to fetch the key - Room 607, right out back, real private like.

"Not long," Mick didn't offer any more than that. A wad of crumpled notes drawn from his wallet, he peeled off a couple. "Keep the change."

As soon as they crossed the threshold, Josef grabbed Mick by the shoulders, manhandled him towards the room's tiny excuse for a shower. The cold tap turned on full, Josef shoved a protesting Mick under the icy spray, and held him there.

"Christ," Mick spluttered, and cursed when Josef had released his hold, wiping beads of water from his face, and trying to catch his breath. "What the fuck did you do that for?"

Josef shrugged, and leant against the frame of the door, his legs crossed at the ankles. "You felt it enough to complain about it, therefore you must exist."

Mick scowled, and grabbed a threadbare towel from the rack. "That isn't what I meant, Josef, I already know I exist. I only have to wake up in a freezer every day to know that."

"Alright then," Josef stepped out the way, as Mick pushed by him; unfazed by Mick's rancour, "Maybe I thought you could do with a bit of a pick me up, get the blood pumping, clear away the cobwebs."

"You're a real asshole sometimes, you know that," Mick began stripping off layers of saturated clothing.

"Oh?" Josef raised an eyebrow, and gestured a hand through the air in front of him. "So tell me, how do you feel right now – a little more sharpened, mind a bit more focused is it?"

"Yeah, alright." Naked except for a pair of Hanes briefs, Mick took a seat on the end of the bed, and fluffed a towel through his wet hair. "The Doors were playing on the radio before," Mick sounded almost wistful as he spoke, "do you remember that summer we spent in San Francisco?"

"I remember you followed Jim Morrison from the Matrix Club one night, because you thought you could smell the distilled essence of life in his blood," Josef chuckled at the memory, and sat down next to Mick. "I also remember the Freshies we were both feeding off."

"Those were some crazy times," Mick gave a laugh of his own, smiled at the nostalgia. "I was trying to make sense of things back then as well."

"And I'm sure getting loaded on acid every night did wonders for that," Josef commented drily, the corners of his mouth drawn upwards in a trademark grin. "Who knows, if you'd kept going maybe you could have had your own little existential crisis every day of the week, explored the universe around your navel. You know, really dug deep."

"Very funny," Mick rolled his eyes, and made a dismissive sound at the back of his throat. The conversation drifted to other times then, other nights they had spent on Sunset Strip.

"I said I love you, and you laughed in my face. I remember that much" Josef responded to the memories with a bitter edged smile.

"I never asked you if you meant it," Mick's voice shifted pensive, his brow lined with thought. He averted his eyes, looked out the muddied glass of the window for a while.

"Are you asking me now, ninety years after the fact?" Josef lay back, stretched out on the mattress, a casual hand rested behind his head.

"Yeah, I am." There was a desperate edge to Mick's words, a questioning that went beyond a simple 'do you love me, yes or no'. He was looking for an anchor; something tangible, on which to pin his awareness of self – you exist, therefore I am.

Josef got up, went to one of the suitcases on the floor, and drew out a bottle of Scotch. Uncapping the lid he took a few draws, and then handed it to Mick. "Here, you look like you could use a drink."

Mick accepted the bottle from Josef's hand, nodded a quick thanks; knocked back a few quick mouthfuls of his own. "You haven't answered my question."

"Strange days, and fantasies of love," Josef flourished a hand through the air, and grabbed the Scotch, before sitting back down. "Like you said, those were crazy times. I got over it."

There was a distinctly cynical note in Josef's voice.

"I'm sorry," Mick couldn't think of what else to say. His arms drawn around Josef's neck, Mick rested his chin atop Josef's shoulder; mixed comfort with remembrance of those lost days.

"It doesn't matter now," Josef tried to wave a dismissive hand, wondered for a moment how they had gone from Mick having a crisis of existence, to this.

"Yeah, it does."

Josef would swear later that Mick hadn't really caught him by surprise - of course he'd known Mick was going to kiss him, he'd seen it coming a mile away. Mick's lips were pressed against Josef's own, his arms drawn tighter around Josef's neck; and suddenly, it seemed, they were kissing like their lives depended it.

"You're the only person in the world besides Beth, who has ever made me want to go on existing," Mick broke the embrace just long enough to remark heatedly.

_And maybe I don't want that sort of responsibility. _Josef's hands went to Mick's underpants; thumb and forefinger hooked under the waistband, he quickly relieved Mick of his garment. For a moment he considered bringing things to a halt. Too late, Mick was already riding hard up against him; his legs wrapped around Josef's waist, his erection ground against the denim covering of Josef's jeans – creating friction, and heat.

There was something sordid about the whole affair, Josef thought as he managed to hold Mick off long enough to slip out of his own clothes; with the paint peeling off the walls and the flickering buzzing of broken neon that could be seen outside their window, and the two of them growling, clawing, and bucking against one another. Sordid was good though, sordid he could do. It was the other he wasn't so sure about.

"I could love you if I had the chance."

"Now he tells me." Josef pretended to scoff, and roll his eyes; his feelings belied by the way his brow creased as Mick spoke those words.

Mick wasn't listening. His movements had shifted frantic. Josef drew his arms around Mick's shoulders, held on as Mick came apart in his arms.

"What about you?" Mick seemed almost embarrassed as he extricated his fangs from Josef's throat, "You didn't…"

"…it doesn't matter," Josef quickly dismissed Mick's concerns. Sex was easy to come by; flash a few dollars around and a certain class of mortal would fall all over themselves to be in your company.

Mick settled alongside; one leg draped across Josef's thigh, his forehead rested against Josef's shoulder. "I meant what I said before - about us," Mick hesitated, "I mean about me – you and me."

"You should try having existential crises more often," Josef tongue in cheeked as he kissed the top of Mick's head. "We should try and get some sleep," Josef said then.

Sans freezer they would be reliant on the extra bags of blood Josef had packed. Josef made sure to remind Mick of this fact, smiling when Mick retorted with an off the cuff remark about boy scouts.

Josef let his eyes fall shut; already lying next to him, he could hear the subtle changes in Mick's breathing; eventually it would cease all together.

_Strange days and fantasies of love…_

They had a long road ahead of them.


End file.
